Tuesday, 18 August 2015

Getting over calamities

So despite last week's calamities, everything is growing nicely on 45 and 47. We borrowed a petrol mower but found it was too wide to get round all the paths on 47 so we borrowed a generator and have taken our little mower from home up to the plot. (Thank you Mum W for the loan of the genny and mower.) It's all looking a lot tidier.

So how is everything looking?

For starters our sweetcorn is coming on a treat. This photo was taken just over a week ago but I like how it makes you feel like you're lost in maize maze and not just a small patch. We have several large husks on all plants, just hoping our friendly neighbourhood pigeons and squirrels leave them alone!

CP's pea experiment has worked and every pea she planted has sprouted! If we're lucky we'll get another crop mid September.

The little P's had insisted on having their own bed on 47. They were motivated in the beginning. They weeded, chose and planted their own seeds, then left them in the greenhouse to grow. Unfortunately they did what children and teenagers do, they 'got bored of waiting' and left their bed for the weeds to take over. (Also not helped by Mr P telling them he'd rotivate it for them before planting) Anyway, the result was that the bed became over run with weeds again.

I got half way along the bed before I had to stop and take more care, having pulled my back, been bitten... just read 'A week of Calamities' and you'll understand my frustration.

Having to slow down and be more careful was a good call as 47 yielded yet another unexpected surprise. Hidden among the weeds were asparagus. If the Little P's and Mr P had weeded and rotivated as planned, we probably would have lost these. The plan is now to divide the bed so we have an asparagus bed. It also means it is more manageable for the Little P's who still insist they want to have the bed next year.

Our gherkins are fruiting and are full of fruit. The next challenge will be finding different recipes for pickling them.

Our cucamelons are still fruiting although we have yet to try them, again the neighbourhood wildlife beat us to it.

Our outside tomatoes are full of flowers and fruit and the marigolds are doing a fantastic job of keeping the aphids and blackfly away.

I love how the light reflects off the freshly watered marigolds in this picture, plus it shows how many flowers we still have on the tomato plants.

So what have we harvested this week?

Definitely a week of surprises on 47, we found our first ripe plums! So sweet and juicy. Looking forward to the glut that is soon to come.

From left to right, our giant gherkin, courgettes, an oddly shaped carrot, a crystal cucumber and a regular cucumber we were given by a friend. Looking forward to trying out some pickling recipes over the coming week.

We pulled our first carrot from 45. The slugs had got to it so we decided to pull it before they finished it off. I think next year we need to make dig deeper still and use more sand, given the way it has split.

We harvested a couple of our Otto courgettes. (We were gifted the plant after the slugs desecrated our original courgette plant.) We deliberately left one to grow more like a marrow as I had a couscous recipe I wanted to try out. I'll share that in my next blog.

We are digging up potatoes on a weekly basis as we need them. Also picked several cherry tomatoes, loganberries and raspberries however, they don't tend to make it home, nom, nom, nom.